So, this is my life.

Implantation: All the questions you ever had, answered.

This am I woke up with a temp dip.. 97.9. Day before I was sitting so pretty at 98.3, I was having some interesting cramps and pressure yesterday– it wasn’t so much pain as it was a feeling of something or other bearing down. So, of course i see my BBT dip and think it’s either a decline in the progesterone in my system (bad) or maybe an implantation dip (triumphant).

And thusly, I had to go about on my journey of trying to get as much information as possible to make me feel better about my situation and myself. I needed to reasearch Implantation Dips to the nth degree. For example– does the temp dip happen BEFORE or AFTER the initial stages of implantation.

From all I have read, the dip happens the day after implantation begins. Since implantation is a process that occurs over several days, this can be confusing. But don’t worry, I did a lot of research on this particular subject:

Here’s how implantation works, for those interested, this graphic really helps:

The graphic shows that on day zero, (Ovulation day) your egg is likely fertilized. It goes along your fallopean tubes dividing cells and basically enjoys being a blastocyst– that’s it’s fancy scientific name. Your little blasto floats along before it starts to “hatch” out of it’s “Zona pellucida” . It then kind of rolls onto your uterus and gets attached here, but the attachment is loose at best — it’s called apposition.

On average, this happens around day 5-6, (or 7 days past the very PEAK of your LH surge.) . So that’s why 5/6DPO is a really normal day to implant, or to start implantation. Your little eggie attaches itself to the uterus loosely, in that apposition phase. Usually, it’s where a little crater on your uterus exists, to help your little egg hold on. Isn’t that fascinating? Anyway, so here;s your egg, and it’s basically just rolled onto your uterus. The next step is called Adhesion. This is when you might start to feel some twiches or twinges (though most people don’t feel anything, per the interwebs). Immediately following, there’s more of an invasion– And this when you really would feel something if you were to feel anything. This part of implantation takes a few days– because it’s a convergence of shared cells and data and hormones. If you want to read all about it, in detail, this link is super informative and helpful.

So, I read this and then followed the internet cookie-crumb trail to look into the issue of implantation cramps. Let’s look at what I have found that are cross-confirmed against many sites (and forums)

2. Most people feel them days 6-1o if they are going to feel them at all

3. You may have some spotting, though this is more uncommon than common

4. The location is the lower abdomen.

Implantation dip– so, here’s a few charts from Fertility Friend on the dip:

The key marker of an implantation dip is that a) your BBT dips, and the b) Your temp jumps back up the next day, and c) it continues to rise to a third “triphastic” level

My concern: last month I had a “dip” on Day 6, and then Day 7 my temp started to go back up. This month it’s Day 7. It makes me wonder if it’s just a sign of the drop in progesterone my body sometimes experiences. I am holding out hope that it’s not the case. Here’s some additional information about Implantation dips and the like for your own reading pleasure:

11% of charts that showed ovulation but did not result in a pregnancy displayed this pattern.

23% of charts that showed ovulation and did result in a pregnancy showed this pattern.

Of the pregnancy charts that showed this pattern, the most likely days for the dip to occur were between 7 and 8 days past ovulation

The dip needs to be at least .3 degrees

Fertility Friend also theorizes the following causes for the dip:

The corpus luteum (which produces the heat inducing hormone, progesterone) normally peaks in its production of progesterone and then begins to recede around the middle of the luteal phase. In conception cycles, it is “rescued” when the embryo implants and then continues to produce progesterone until the placenta can take over hormone production.

Estrogen, in opposition to progesterone, has a lowering effect on temperatures. A secondary estrogen surge in the middle of the luteal phase may cause a temperature dip at this time. Indeed this may explain why this pattern also occurs on non-pregnant charts. Mid-luteal phase estrogen levels, however, have been found to be higher in conception cycles than non-conception cycles and this may also contribute to the greater frequency with which we see this pattern on pregnancy charts.